(this is meant to be further thoughts on the previous post. but then it got posted before an explanatory sentence and a couple of other bits were included)
Yesterday Saint Aardvark put on some Josh Rouse, to get the annoying children’s music out of his head. A lovely song called “Dressed up like Nebraska. (But I can’t touch you where you are / There you stood dressed up like Nebraska / Plain as day) Very soothing and melodic and Josh Rouse has a voice smoother than all the dairy products in the world put together in a blender. But Josh Rouse makes me nostalgic. He brings to mind our road trip in the old, carpeted van, the months after when I lived in a very green-walled apartment; alone except for the thousands of cockroaches. He makes my heart seize up in a goodbad way. He does not allow me to go about my business because I am mired in bittersweet reflection, remembering what year it is, marveling that I have known Saint Aardvark for 13 years.
(13 years ago we were dating, blushing, having hours-long telephone conversations. Can you believe that happy-crappy?)
I went through a brief catalogue in my head and realized: all the music I already own that is of a soothing nature has been used and abused many times over for Significant Life Events. No value can be accorded to the music, per se. Josh Rouse is not better or worse than Jack Johnson. Some music means more to me than other music, that’s all.
But Jack Johnson is just tunes. I never kissed a boy to his music. I never wrote my last exam, got a piercing, got stoned or consoled a sad friend while his music was playing. The only things I have done while his music was playing are: water aerobics and shop.
I am fully committed to my nostalgia but even I cannot make something tear-jerky out of water aerobics or shopping. Nosiree.
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